the last visit

The g'kid has been returned home. The last g'kid week is done. The first two were spaced out a bit but the last two were back to back.

I've had fun. I've gotten to see four movies, I've gone to the beach twice, did some baking, saw fireworks, assisted in the production of several craft projects, been to the local museum three times and reacquainted myself with sewing (that's Autumn in her new dress on the left). There's also been a lot of food involved and the cleaning up, a lot of not swearing and not farting because your g'kids will point it out to you.

In the wake of the failed air conditioner, we headed for the beach once again on Friday. Conditions couldn't have been more different. Last week there was a nice wind, enough and the water was fairly calm, only two sets of small breakers. Our shelter was easy to put up and was stable, some seaweed littered the sand.

Our second visit, the wind was blowing very strongly and the water was much more turbulent with continuous lines of breakers all the way past the last sandbar. Getting the shelter erected was like holding onto a parachute filled with wind. We did get it secured eventually but it flapped fiercely and continuously afterwards. The tide was higher and the beach was covered with a thick spongy mat of the sargasso seaweed that had been washing in all week.

We saw a mermaid stranded on the beach.

While we did see some pelicans, there were not as many. But. I did see a white heron fishing in the shallows. That was the first time I have ever seen a heron at the beach.

We picked up a lot of shells. Most of them were worn smooth, their outer coatings removed to expose the translucent layers of color underneath.

Some of the broken pieces of the larger shells resembled potshards like you would find in an archeological site or in some of the southwest canyonlands.

Earlier in the week at home when Autumn and I were out, a juvenile blue heron (at least I think that is what it was) came to visit our backyard. These pictures were taken through a screen and a not too clean window by Marc.

You can see it's markings in the picture on the right.

Now that all the g'kid visits are done we are planning to get moving on several projects that have been waiting like getting the shop roofed at the very least. All this rain the past month has not done the framing any good. We have a small job to finish next week and I'm really wanting to get started on some new models. Ah, but first I have to put the house and studio back in order.